Karlyn Williams
February 16, 2014
IS 246, Winter 2014

Beautyman, W., & Shenton, A. (2009). When does an academic information need stimulate a school-inspired information want? Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 41, 67-80.

Abstract
This study, conducted in Northeast England, is an interpretivist ethnography of two 7-8 year old classes in a primary school from September 2006 to July 2007. During this time Beautyman acted almost as a classroom assistant, interacting directly with children and becoming apart of class activities during their instruction and activities on historical periods and geography subjects. With the intent of focusing on children in the second key stage of development, Beautyman interacted with and observed children throughout the school year, attending class eighty-eight days during this period. The classes she observed consisted of six females and seventeen males in the first class and a second class of eight girls and seventeen boys. Her purpose was to witness them in their most natural state to determine their strategies and motivations for attaining information about topics raised during class or homework time.
Analyzed using grounded theory, the study found that students were intrinsically motivated to ask questions and seek information for comprehension of class subjects that created some cognitive discourse or appealed to their personal interests. The researcher is also able to commit to a four-part typology of information seeking among these children based on patterns explained by specific child examples. These findings bring about suggestions to empower students to successfully create and follow through with information wants.